Clarification Sought on CIT Judgment in Trade Adjustment Assistance Case

The Department of Justice requested in a June 3 filing that the Court of International Trade clarify what the correct standard of review is for the court's remand of a trade adjustment assistance case (see 2105040032). The clarification request comes after a May 4 CIT remand that found that the Labor Department failed to discuss or even reference the evidence of why trade adjustment assistance was necessary in its determination (Communications Workers of America Local 4123, on behalf of Former Employees of AT&T Services, Inc. v. United States Secretary of Labor, CIT #20-00075).

The appearance of the decision was that it appropriately applied a substantial evidence standard since the Administrative Procedure Act's arbitrary and capricious standard of review "does not apply to Labor's factual determinations," DOJ said. However, in the decision, the court relied on multiple cases that applied the APA arbitrary and capricious standard of review, DOJ said in its request for clarification.

Quick to respond with a June 4 brief in opposition to the clarification, the plaintiffs said that the defendant's motion "rests on the false premise that Labor's fact-findings, and the reasoning Labor provided to support such findings, are one and the same and subject to the same standard of review." Pointing to a U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit precedential opinion, Changzhou Wujin Fine Chem. Factory Co., Ltd. v. United States, they said that under similar circumstances, the appellate court ruled that the court must apply both the substantial evidence and arbitrary and capricious standards in its review of agency action.